Discover the pioneer of pop art in this introduction to Roy Lichtenstein, whose striking, comic-book aesthetic images burst onto the American art scene in the late 1950s and forever transformed the notion of the visual arts.

The pop star

When Art Made Wham!

American painter Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997) sparked an artistic renewal in his country when he burst onto a scene dominated by abstract expressionism in New York in the late 1950s and defined a new creative language for a new era.

With his innovative use of industrial production techniques and trivial, everyday images, such as cartoons, comic strips and advertising, Lichtenstein joined contemporary artists such as Andy Warhol and James Rosenquist in portraying and satirising the media and consumerist culture in the United States. In works such as Look, Mickey! (1961), Drowning Girl (1963) and Whaam! (1963) he applied large-scale production methods, in particular Ben Day's dot technique, to create a reverberation effect and his distinctive pixelated dot style.

This book offers an essential overview of Lichtenstein's career, from his early pop creations to the brushstrokes of the Brushstrokes series, through abstract expressionism and the reinterpretation of contemporary masterpieces. We will discover his great influence on mid-twentieth-century modern art and see how his work represents both a critique and a chronicle of the United States of that time.

About the author

Janis Hendrickson studied art history at Smith College and received her PhD from Martin Warnke in Hamburg. She is currently a writer and exhibition curator.

• Pages: 96
• Language: English
• Author: Janis Hendrickson
• Year: 2016
• MODEL: 9783836532075

Publisher: Taschen